As packet-switched networks, such as the Internet, come into wider use, they are being utilized to carry other information beside data, such as telephone traffic.
In industrialized countries, telephone systems have become extremely reliable, and people have come to demand this high reliability as a norm. When they use the Internet to carry telephone calls, they expect similar reliability. However, the Internet has not yet developed this level of reliability, partly because of its youthful age.
In addition, while both telephone systems and the Internet utilize similar methodologies and equipment, they nevertheless represent fundamentally different technologies. As a result, the technical features of a modern telephone network which are responsible for its high reliability are, in general, not directly transferable to the Internet.
Consequently, a need exists to improve the reliability of packet-switched networks, such as the Internet.